Project Paper Doll: The Trials Read Online Free

your absence on Friday, as you requested.” Jacobs’s voice was muffled as he turned away from the intercom outside my cell to call
after his granddaughter. “I explained your trip to Chicago has an academic aspect, and Mr. Kohler has agreed that a five-page paper on the architecture of the city should be more than enough
to—”
    “Five pages?” Rachel shrieked.
    “Chicago? She’s coming with us?” I blurted, the wad of toilet paper forgotten in my hands. He was bringing Rachel to the trials? Since when had this top secret competition
become a spectator sport? The thought of her smug face watching from the bleachers made me feel ill. I still didn’t know exactly what the trials would involve. Dr. Jacobs claimed not to know.
The event was supposedly shrouded in secrecy, to prevent one competitor from having an advantage over another.
    Dr. Jacobs turned to me, startled. “Don’t be ridiculous. Rachel is accompanying her friends on a shopping outing.” He glared at me, as though I was the one revealing
secrets.
    “Wait, you’re letting her out?” Rachel asked her grandfather, a beat too slow on the uptake. Was it just me, or had her face gone a shade paler?
    “It’s nothing for you to be concerned with,” Dr. Jacobs said, lifting his hands reassuringly.
    Rachel shuddered. “Just keep her away from Michigan Avenue. I don’t want her spoiling anything for us. Cassi’s always filling out those stupid giveaway cards. It’s about
time she actually won something nonpathetic. They’re sending a car for us on Friday.” She paused with a frown. “I hope the driver knows to bring spring water—the carbonated
kind, not that cheap regular stuff.”
    Then she turned and stalked off toward the elevator. I felt Dr. Jacobs’s attention return to me.
    I chucked the toilet paper into the tiny plastic trash can (white, just like everything else in here) and resumed my place on the floor, forgetting until I was in position that I’d already
done sit-ups and my stomach was not in a forgiving mood.
    “That was more emotive than you’ve been in a while,” Jacobs said conversationally as I forced myself through another set of five.
    I didn’t know whether he meant my shouting at Rachel earlier or the vomiting on the floor, but I wasn’t going to ask.
    What he said sounded like a statement, but I knew better. It was bait with a bright, shiny hook buried inside. He’d been trying to get me to talk for weeks now, to open up, as he said.
    A horrible idea that brought to mind the image of my skull being cracked open with everything spilling out for further examination, speculation, and admiration of his handiwork.
    I gave a shake of my head, more to myself than him. No, damn it. My feelings and thoughts were mine, at least. The only things that were, in this place. And I was going to keep them.
    Instead, I lay on the floor, giving my abused muscles a break, and retrained my efforts on the other side of my new exercise regime. With barely any exertion, I had my cot suspended above me
again, along with my initial stack of books, gathered and reassembled in midair. Once, something like this would have been difficult for me and the results unpredictable. The lightbulbs overhead
would have blown and anything not bolted down would have been shaking and shifting.
    Not anymore. Amazing what grim, uncompromising determination would do for you.
    “Your improvement is quite impressive, particularly for such a short amount of time,” Jacobs said, after a moment. “Then again, I suppose that might be due to your newly
acquired motivation.”
    I went still, and the books wobbled slightly. Was that an oblique reference to Zane’s death? If Jacobs had guessed my intention to raze Project Paper Doll to the ground, personnel
included, I wasn’t sure what he would do. He needed me to compete in the trials but certainly not at the risk of loss, humiliation, and death.
    I let out my breath slowly, straining to maintain an